ISO FileMaker Magazine

Providing users with some type of indication about where they are within the current layout is always a nice thing. People don't typically like that feeling of being lost and there are multiple ways to indicate where the user is. A simple header or label is always one of the easiest ways, but, what if you're using disconnected objects. In that case, the navigation itself can often act as the indicator.

The combination of either multiple buttons or a Button Bar, with a tab panel or slider is a very common thing within a more complex FileMaker layout. In this video, I walk through the process of adding some navigational indicators to an existing solution which is provided for free by Soliant Consulting. There's a lot to learn with regards to object management, some object naming and related trickery and making that disconnected situation between buttons and panels a connected one which will facilitate navigation that clearly indicates where you are within the layout.

Sometimes, it's the little things you learn that make working with Claris/FileMaker so enjoyable. Things like making a Button Bar balanced when hiding segments and not having to use any scripts or extra code (unless desired) to do it.

This video presents a great little technique of how you can use a Hide calculation on your button bar segments yet still maintain the same relative button size. With this little bit of know-how, you can easily stack various button bars and provide all kinds of progressive disclosure of various solution features.

Add this simple trick to your arsenal of great UI tricks for Claris/FileMaker.

FileMaker provides a good number of UI widgets which allow for a wide mix of cool things. Sometimes, it's all about knowing the various features and functions which allow you to implement a really helpful navigation feature.

For this video/article release you're going to find a wonderful technique which allows you to assign keyboard commands to the navigation of a Button Bar widget.

There are a number of ways this technique could be used, but the fundamental reason for doing so is because you don't always want the user to use a mouse to navigate your Button Bars. So, if your solution has any use for Button Bars, which allow a user to navigate to various areas, be it Layouts, Sliders or Tabs, then give this video and its associated technique file a good look over!

If it's not absolutely necessary, preventing a user from accessing parts of your software is a bit better than letting them know what's possible or what's hidden from them. It also allows a given group of users to focus better without presenting options which may not apply to the functions they perform.

In this video and technique file, we take a look at two tricks combined into one. We're making single segments of a button bar hide and show, without resizing, and we're doing this based on a user's collective security access.

If you've had a FileMaker solution grow to the point where all users still have access to all things, then you'll find some great information in this video about limiting access to certain features of your user interface. This video and technique file will give you the insight into providing a limited set of options based on the access levels you define.

There are all kinds of methods in which you can provide visual feedback to users. You can use FileMaker's containers fields, calculation fields, and even normal text fields.

There is, however, a great way to provide the visual feedback you desire by using FileMaker's Button Bar object. You gain a lot of flexibility with this method because it's so easy to copy and paste once you've put it into your solution. By using multiple segments in the button bar, and some creative use of hiding and conditional formatting, you can achieve all kinds of cool visual indications of whatever you might want to showcase.

In this video, I walk through the process of adding some up/down arrows and show you how to take advantage of FileMaker's unique tool set in order to accomplish this useful technique.

There are all kinds of nice graphic tips and tricks within FileMaker and one of my most favorite is using the transparent line setting in order to create the rounded effect on multiple segment Button Bars.

Some buttons in your user interface are likely more than obvious in terms of what they do. But what about those times when they're not and it's just nice to let the user know what just happened? Using a combination of Slider panels and mutli-segment Button Bars you can provide any type of feedback you might like to show.

This video presents a method for showing the user some feedback about the results of clicking a button or any other user interface action taken.

Note to subscribers: If you're looking for the file, then you'll find it within the Part 11 download. The link is provided below.

When developing within tools like Xcode, the sky’s the limit in terms of providing user interaction and user feedback. Fortunately, with FileMaker, we have access to many of the core interaction elements from iOS. Popovers are a great example of a critical iOS UI element.

When FileMaker 13 was released we got the wonderful Popover objects. To follow that up within FileMaker 14, we got the new objects named Button Bars. These new objects were an enhancement on the ages old Button objects. The cool addition to these legacy objects was the fact that we can use multiple segments (buttons) within Button Bars. Each of these segments can then take advantage of the existing features. They can simply act as buttons or become Popovers in their own right.

The primary, and key distinction with Button Bars over standard buttons is access to FileMaker’s calculation engine. With access to the calc engine, we can now do a lot of things to the data shown on those buttons which can’t be done with standard buttons.

When you consider that a Button Bar can have any number of segments from one to 400 (which I wouldn’t suggest) you can think of a lot of creative uses for not just user interaction, but for user feedback and information display as well.

This video showcases a number of creative uses for FileMaker’s Button Bar objects.